French Proverbs ≍ Proverbes français

Like a fit picture, a proverb could be worth 'a thousand words'. Try to let popular wisdom into your conversation the day you're up to it, as "Un oiseau dans la main, en vaut deux dans le bois (A bird in the hand is worth two in the bush)" - whatever that is taken to mean. It is also up to you.

Great folks learn to consider things on top of historical developments or
trends, and that special sort of estimation (thinking) is often much helped by select,
classy proverbs. Excellent proverbs may assist a maturing individual too.

Good thinking is fit for you and me. And much fit and good can come into the one who learns to consider well before talking. One should learn to think "hm" at least initially, for it often helps to consider this and that some way or other.

Lots of people like proverbs. And maybe we have nothing better to do that try to get to some laconic or terse sayings in English out of French proverbs. If so, the ones we start out from, had better seem fit and Solomonic. And what we end up with, should appear as poignant, hopefully relevant and tidy enough in many a valuable setting and ministry. And why not also seek to keep the renditions (equivalents) or (direct) translations tied in with the original French proverbs we took off from? History shows both approaches can work well.

In fact, many typical British proverbs were handed over from French in medieval times - more or less as equivalents, and often as direct translations. Put in other words: As The Concise Oxford Dictionary of Proverbs (3rd edition, 1998) shows, this process has been much more common than hitherto thought of.

Also, after Erasmus of Rotterdam published adages in the 1500s, many "international medieval" proverbs were made from Latin and Greek sayings, some of which were terse aces of learning from days gone by. "The highest right is often the highest evil" is one classy medieval proverb. It may deserve much consideration.

Just as many French proverbs derive from Latin, and very many British proverbs derive from French ones, there were other inroads as well. Let's not forget the long-range ministry of Normans, descendants of Scandinavian Vikings for most part. They took over the better half of Italy a long time ago, captured England and many other places, even in what is today Iraq, Tunesia and so on, and found it fit to collect treasures - and word-treasures should not be excluded from what they're credited with bringing to Normandy and Britain either.

For many French proverbs there is a word-for-word equivalent in English. It's due to much contact in the centuries after the Norman conquest of England in AD 1066. Normandy and England was a Norman twin realm for a hundred years after that, till the time of King Richard the Lionhearted. The contact went on for centuries after that, affecting the language, manners and rituals of the British.

This could be good to recognise and adjust to. And this too: Well selected and carefully bundled proverbs may be turned into excellent channels for learning. It's a new field of study. It should be recognised as one elongated or prolonged field of "folk pedagogy", a term that Dr. Jerome Bruner has become fond of in his later years. His book The Culture of Education is in part about it, particularly the fourth chapter. [1996]

L'avis de la femme est de peu de prix, mais qui ne le prend pas est un sot. The advice (opinion) of the woman is seldom much priced, but he who does not take it is stupid. A woman's advice is no great thing, but he who won't take it is a fool [Mertvago, p. 19].

Le bossu ne voit pas sa bosse, mais il voit celle de son confrère. The uneven one does not see his bump, but sees that of his fellow-man [Mertvago, p. 24].

Le vieux amis et les vieux écus sont les meilleurs. The old friends and the old ecus (ecu: a currency unit - "crowns") are the best. [Écus are old French coins. The first écu, of the 1200s, was a gold coin. During the 1600s and 1700s, silver écus were made. The écu dissappeared during the French Revolution.] [Mertvago, p. 14]

Le vin est tiré, il faut le boire. Now the ale is drawn, it must he drunk [Belcour, p. 31].

Les avares font nécessité de tout. Miserly, greedy natures make a great need of everything.

A BRIEFING. The selected, old collections here are rather large, with the exception of the charming, slender book by "NN" (Anonymous). The author may be C. Stojanovitch, but I have not got it confirmed. When there is no information as to who is the author(s) of a book, the ordinary procedure is to have the publisher there instead. I chose "NN" in this case, for the sake of simplicity.
Among the more newly published books in the list, two large ones by Maloux (Larousse) and Dournon are in French only. And the book by Brezin-Rossignol is larger than that of Mertvago.

Belcour, G., comp. French Proverbs with English Equivalents: A Selection of the Most Used French Proverbs. London: Edward Stanford, 1882.

Speake, Jennifer, ed. The Oxford Dictionary of Proverbs. 5th ed. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2008. ⍽▢⍽ The debt from Medieval times of English proverbs to French and other continental ones is still mentioned, as in the third edition (the book above), but rephrased, toned down. Yet the fact remains.